New Ken Kutaragi interview (2) @ PC Watch

[NavNucST3]

I don't think you'll ever be able to upgrade the RAM; rather, I think you'll be able to perhaps buy workstation-esque PS3's down the line that simply have more RAM. If such a design model comes to fruition that is.

I think the Amiga model is what we should try to hone in around rather than taking it back to the PC again and again; a superior architecture can take you some distance even on 'meager' specs in other areas.

When I say superior also I'm refering to Cell and it's areas of strength, rather than a straight PS3 > PC type claim, which is not what I believe. But there should be definite points of brilliance.

Yes, but then that takes down the road of Atari ST vs Amiga debates, its an endless cycle

 

[one]

for those that misinterpreted KK's interview



Its apparent he wasnt refering to RAM upgrades

Well that's Kawanishi's words, but what Kutaragi's saying in the interview contradicts it. I believe what the CEO of the company says, though Probably Kutaragi is talking about a more PC-like high-end configuration which may or may not appear in the future.

Where can I find the furukawa blog? google really couldn't help. non linear video is very interesting

The link is the top of the first post in this thread but it's in Japanese! The demo was only meant for selected VIPs apparently and he could get permission to write about it on his blog, he says no media could get in the demo room.

 

[Farid]

That's yet another "I agree with that" post here

me too

http://www.beyond3d.com/forum/showthread.php?t=22121

Abbreviations, one liners and other useless posts

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[mckmas8808]

I'm going to take it you don't see the irony in that post, "litter", def: 4 a : trash, wastepaper, or garbage lying scattered about.

I had always wondered how you envisioned "reality".

Okay you know what I meant. This is a spelling contest. I'm quite sure you know what reality is. And since you didn't bring up the merits of my argument, I just you agree with my point. :smile:

 

[LunchBox]

KK: The (business) model of the game consists of contents and hardware business. If there's one more, in the Nintendo days it was royalties. But our message at this time on PS3 is clear. Hardware is hardware (Hardware does its own business).

From what I have precieved in this part of the interview, on the part of comparing the PC model to the PS3, it seems Sony isn't losing money on the PS3 hardware but rather has ingeniusly passed the bill directly to the consumers... Am I wrong or is this a fair assessment of the interview?</p>

 

[Nesh]

From what I have precieved in this part of the interview, on the part of comparing the PC model to the PS3, it seems Sony isn't losing money on the PS3 hardware but rather has ingeniusly passed the bill directly to the consumers... Am I wrong or is this a fair assessment of the interview?</p>

Depends. Passing the "bill" to the consumer can also make Sony lose money.

Only if demand is inelastic enough they wont but still even if it is inelastic, I dont think Sony is selling it as much as the manufacturing cost. I believe it is still less priced than the cost. What Sony did I believe was to atleast minimize a bit the losses.

 

[Naboomagnoli]

From what I have precieved in this part of the interview, on the part of comparing the PC model to the PS3, it seems Sony isn't losing money on the PS3 hardware but rather has ingeniusly passed the bill directly to the consumers... Am I wrong or is this a fair assessment of the interview?</p>

You're not wrong, but it's a fair assessment of a couple of sentences of the whole interview.

HG: Can I think like this, traditionally game consoles have been taking the business model that relies on not only the profit from hardware. But, if you want people to use PS3 as a computer, that model does not work. If you can't do business by getting enough profit from hardware you can't grow software on a computer. Therefore you can't take the business model in which the profit from hardware is very thin, which is what I assume.

KK: Yes. In terms of the business model, it changes in PS3. (When it becomes a computer) the business model in which you lose in hardware and balance it by royalties doesn't work. I want people to share the PS3 computer and then want gunmen or top gun (programmers) to show their skill.

The hardware is indeed priced higher to minimise/avoid losses per unit; however because of the freedom for "gunmen"(!) to produce for PS3 we'll be getting a lot of freeware instead.

Speculatively it may also mean that, with Sony making a profit on hardware sooner rather than later, as production costs reduce over time Sony may have the option to lower the SKU pricing sooner. Maybe?

Please note that I know nothing of the hardware price vs costs strategies used in console lifecycles; at a complete guess it's "release console at a loss, work hard on reducing costs until you approach breaking even/a small profit, then lower the price so that they sell at a minor loss, reduce costs more till you make a pretty decent profit, then make sure that once you go into the $200/£150 mass-market price region you're breaking even/making a small profit on each console sold.

I'm convinced that's wrong; the question is how wrong?

 

[liolio]

May be it's a way to tell "don't expect price drop until manucfacturing costs really go down...."

Anyway I understand why Ms is happy they're polishing vista, and the revamped media center edition will sell very well, synergy with vista is a key point.
Actualy convergence is the key word in technology. (i work for orange and they 're trying to offer convergence of different communication device)

i'm sure Ms think that marketting wise Sony work in the wrong direction.
More I think they have grin on face like "come on Sony, shown us your secure stable, and easy going Os based on linux..."

The Ps3 can be a cheap computer, but 256mb af ram seems very weak for me, and worst we have no clue about the os advancement and it's not something you can pull easily out of the air.

Mots will think that I'm bias, but everybody already have a mp3player they con connect to almost any hi-fi devices the media center is already PC. How many Pc in the world?
Lot of people download music and movies on theur PC.
What is the place of the PS3 as a media center (except hd player, worse it for hdtv user I think good buy in fact...)

Sony should focus on strenght of the ps3 Ie deliver awesome games and
deliver a good online service plus sell bluray as futur proof device.
Anyway KK is not dumb at all, his achievements and his carrier are AMAZING but not very good at PR I think he has too much humour and is dreaming awaken some time...
I'm sure a lot of Sony marketting are very unhappy with this interview to say the least...

I can't remenber where but I read a SCEI regional director said that sony don't care losing market share if the market is growing...
May be a way to set investissors mind in a not too picky mood...

 

[ElStupido]

interesting:
Sony Exec: Music Industry Is Losing The Battle Against Piracy
This statement supports the assumption that Sony changed its plans slightliy in favor of opensource and less restrictions.

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Doesn't really seem to support that view to me. It's just saying that making things hard or problematic for consumers (rootkits anyone...) to deter piracy actually increases it, because the users can't be arsed with all that hassle and rebel. If you treat your legitimate customers like potential pirates, you deserve rebellion. Having bought stuff over CONNECT there's a zillion reasons why just downloading files is preferable.

In contrast software piracy on PS3 isn't an issue to spearhead open platforms and homebrew developments, and the solutions raised in that article could be ferociously closed platform.

 

[one]

Added a summary of the third segment of the interview at the end of the OP, it's about network and Cell computing but details are still not clear.

 

[Carl B]

From what I have precieved in this part of the interview, on the part of comparing the PC model to the PS3, it seems Sony isn't losing money on the PS3 hardware but rather has ingeniusly passed the bill directly to the consumers... Am I wrong or is this a fair assessment of the interview?</p>

SCE is predicting a $900 million loss this year in association with the PS3 launch, so I think it's safe to say that at least at this stage, they will be losing money per unit manufactured. The hardware will of course turn profitable over time (maybe within a year), but I question whether they will ever be able to successfully raise the hardware margins above their historical norms without risking consumer alienation.

 

[TheChefO]

but I question whether they will ever be able to successfully raise the hardware margins above their historical norms without risking consumer alienation.

I agree - one would assume this would be diffiucult if not impossible with the current market, but then with Sony's recent moves I wouldn't rule out the possibility of them trying ...

 

[msia2k75]

Adding more confusion with a very high price and all aint going to help in any way consumer to buy a PS3. Ken is funny sometimes but seriously he's not a PR man (or a terrible one).

Some people here are asking questions about PS3 and when they told about the price of the machine, the price of the games, HDD, multiple SKUs and other stuff like this, they are quite confused and kinda afraid in the end. This coupled with a weak E3 and declarations ala Mr. Reeves certainly arent helping really.

 

[LunchBox]

Thanks guys for clarifying and explaining I appreciate it!

 

[Arty]

Well that's Kawanishi's words, but what Kutaragi's saying in the interview contradicts it. I believe what the CEO of the company says, though Probably Kutaragi is talking about a more PC-like high-end configuration which may or may not appear in the future.

Alluding to a higher-end configuration appearing in the future will put off many people who intend to get one at launch, like me. :|

 

[Shifty Geezer]

Alluding to a higher-end configuration appearing in the future will put off many people who intend to get one at launch, like me. :|

But that's the same with all higher tech. Why buy a computer or GPU or mobile phone now when a better one will be released in the future?

 

[sonyps35]

I dont know if this is considered taking the thread OT or what but here goes.

I found this Howard Stringer interview summation amusing/interesting, but not worthy of it's own post

http://www.gamerevolution.com/news/view.php?id=1556

 

[pakotlar]

Certainly I'm not going to get hung up on it. I just feel it's a bit dubious to have an interview where you go on and on about the personal computing potential of your console and then compare it to a premium system. As Titanio responds:

Obviously, you can't just transplant the guts of the PS3 into a Mac mini and call it a day. Apple designed the Mac mini has a personal computer that happens to fit nicely in the living room (or more likely, as a multimedia styled computer, not to be confused with a media center PC). Other than the BD drive, the things you list only help out on the game console side and is superflous to the personal computer side.

This is the problem with the all-in-one package. It has to make trade-offs, either in performance/feature or in cost. On the console side, they went for performance at the expense of cost. On the personal computer side, well, they went for cost at the expense of performance/features (thinking OOOE, more usable RAM).

I'm only humbly suggesting that what Sony seems to be targetting on the personal computing side could be accomplished with a budget line PC. As such, any comparison to a more expensive computer is completely missing the point, either on purpose or simply by speaking too loosely.

I agree wholly with this post. 5 stars. It comes down to market appeal, not brand appeal. What apple sells is a decent HTPC that does what it needs to do at a strong price point. Sony is missing the boat by selling an app that does a lot and costs as such, but in a market where the app needs to only play games. So they are giving users a lot of functionality, but much of it is not going to be used, or is not good enough as a selling point to the market they are targeting. Gamers need a console to do very little other than provide a great gaming experience (and rationally are looking for the device that provides the best experience available on the market). Other features like Linux support, web browser, and HTPC capabilities are nice, but only as a bonus; they do not push systems (though admittedly the streaming capabilities of the original xbox, as well as 360 are nice). Look at the PSP vs. DS. Both set out to play games, but PSP tries to incorporate a lot of other applications, and in the end only games are really being played on the system. You can argue that things like web browser and UMD disc support are nice, but the PSP does not play movies or browse the web well enough to be sold on that appeal. As a result of the all-in one device marketing approach, it becomes a bit of a jack-of all master of none sort of thing. The PSP delivers a lot of capability but little content where it is needed (at least compared to the DS). I doubt Sony is taking as much focus off the games as it is claiming through its PR campaign (marketing as a computer and all that nonsense), but it is still to be seen if Xbox360 can provide a better experience (Live Arcade especially excites me). I'm not very eloquent right now, but it is almost 6am. Hope this makes sense. Gnight.

Btw, I want MGS4 so bad

 

[Naboomagnoli]

Look at the PSP vs. DS. Both set out to play games, but PSP tries to incorporate a lot of other applications, and in the end only games are really being played on the system. You can argue that things like web browser and UMD disc support are nice, but the PSP does not play movies or browse the web well enough to be sold on that appeal. As a result of the all-in one device marketing approach, it becomes a bit of a jack-of all master of none sort of thing. The PSP delivers a lot of capability but little content where it is needed (at least compared to the DS).

Interestingly enough I don't know many people who actually play games on their PSP, they just have movies on their 1 or 2GB memory stick for when they commute to and from London (which is every working day), and play the odd game every now and then. I'm certainly getting plenty of use out of my PSP, only playing the odd game of PES and the locoRoco demo (though I do intend to pick up Syphon Filter when I get half the chance - I loved the first one more than MGS!).

It amuses me the number of times people refer to the DS and PSP, valuing either one above the other as leverage to their arguments. It really doesn't seem like many people have had the same feedback from their local cross-section of society. The only thing people seem unanimous about is that UMD movies are a waste of time!